Chicago, San Francisco Consider Admissions Changes for Magnets

Two of the nation's largest districts are considering changes to
their desegregation programs that would allow more neighborhood
children to attend magnet schools that for years have been geared to
citywide admissions.

In Chicago, administrators early this month proposed setting aside
30 percent of placements in the city's 43 magnet schools for
neighborhood children. The proposal by the district's chief executive
officer, Paul G. Vallas, has set off a debate about which students
deserve access to the magnet schools--which are widely considered to be
the district's best schools.

Chicago officials have already agreed to phase in their proposed
neighborhood set-aside by making it 15 percent next year, with the
possibility of increasing it to 30 percent the year after.

Meanwhile, San Francisco Superintendent Waldemar Rojas has proposed
setting aside 40 percent of kindergarten places for neighborhood
children in the district's 15 alternative elementary schools, which are
similar to magnet schools in that they draw students from throughout
the city.

In both cities, the proposals are being cheered by parents who live
near the highly desirable schools but have been unable to enroll their
children in them.

"How can you explain to your children that they cannot go to a
magnet school right across the street?" Natividad Hernandez, a Chicago
parent and member of the local school council at Orozco Community
Academy, said at a recent public hearing.

But other parents and observers view the proposed changes as a sign
of a reduced commitment to integration.

"To have a magnet program that brings children together from across
the city is a wonderful educational experience," said Julie Woestehoff,
the executive director of Parents United for Responsible Education, a
Chicago parents' group. "And it will be damaged if we have a large
neighborhood set-aside."

Busing Curtailed

Other cities have grappled with the issue of opening magnet programs
to neighborhood children, but Chicago and San Francisco are among the
largest to do so. The proposals come at a time when more parents are
questioning traditional desegregation remedies such as busing and
assigned schools.

In addition to the neighborhood-set-aside proposal, officials of the
424,000-student Chicago district want to restrict busing to magnet
schools to only those students who live within six miles of a
school.

"This change is being made because excessively long bus rides are
not in the best interests of the children, particularly when equally
viable options are available closer to home," Mr. Vallas said in an
Oct. 10 letter to parents.

The restriction could cut transportation costs by as much as $11
million a year, which would free up money to establish new magnet
programs, Chicago officials say.

Critics contend the neighborhood set-aside in Chicago is designed to
free up magnet spaces for children from affluent families who live on
the city's predominantly white North Side.

Designs for Change, a Chicago watchdog group that questions the
set-aside proposal, released an analysis showing that many magnet
schools in low-income areas already draw 30 percent or more of their
enrollments from children in the neighborhood. But most magnets in
upper-middle-class, mostly white neighborhoods take less than 30
percent of their students from nearby homes.

"We are concerned that low-income students of all racial and ethnic
groups will be adversely affected by this proposed change," Joan Jeter
Slay, the associate director of Designs for Change, said in a letter to
the city's desegregation monitoring commission. Some 34,700 students in
the district attend magnet schools.

But district officials countered that the proposed neighborhood
set-aside was being welcomed in black and Hispanic neighborhoods.
Officials expect the district's board of trustees to vote on the
proposal by late next month.

San Francisco Hearings

In San Francisco, officials plan hearings this week and early next
month to explain their proposal to open alternative schools to more
neighborhood children. Mr. Rojas said in an Oct. 9 letter to school
board members that the change will "build a neighborhood residential
base for each elementary alternative school."

"There is no intention to dilute our desegregation efforts," said
Gail Kaufman, a spokeswoman for the 64,000-student district. Under the
district's desegregation consent decree, no school is supposed to have
a student enrollment drawn more than 40 percent from any racial or
ethnic group.

Carol Kocivar, the president of the San Francisco PTA, said the
organization has not taken a stand on the proposal because it is
hearing from parents on both sides.

"People who have enrolled their children in alternative schools
under the current system are expressing concern that they won't be able
to get them in as easily," she said. "The point on the other side is
that there are a lot of children who can't go to school close to
home."

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